


The Calm Before the Storm

by alittlebriton



Category: Alias (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Background Character Death, F/M, Future Fic, Post-Canon, Underage Drinking, Underage Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-12 15:42:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4485215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittlebriton/pseuds/alittlebriton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spoilers up to 5.08.  Future-fic.  Based on the assumption that Sark is DA's age, I've paired at 41 year-old Sark and a 17 year-old Isabelle, for my sins, along with Syd/Tom.  Storms occur when heat meets cold.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Calm Before the Storm

Isabelle pulls at her dress, trying to get some air between the clammy fabric and her equally clammy skin. It is far too hot for this time of year. She takes a furtive drag of her cigarette and tries to ignore the sounds of laughter coming from the building behind her. She was happy for her mom, she really was, but she didn’t see why this wedding was such a big deal. Her mom had been with Tom for over ten years, so it wasn’t like their commitment to each other was in question. But her mom had said something about her never getting to her weddings, and then she went out to see Grandpa Jack for a while, and when she came back, Isabelle had ignored her red eyes.

She drags her heel against the asphalt outside the hotel and wishes that she would feel more like she belonged. Tom is great, was great, when he and her mom first hooked up, but by then Milo had been two years old and a total tantrum thrower, so he had had his hands full looking after his son. And Sydney was so protective of Milo, even though he was a boy and could totally look out for himself, and Izzy had felt left alone again. Just like that night when she was four and her mother had been making this wailing noise in her room and she had crept in to stroke her mother’s hair. She had asked her mom why she was crying, and her mother had told her that her grandmother had died.

Then things had begun disappearing from their house, sports magazines, and clothes, and then a large pile of letters that Izzy didn’t dare read, and one day she caught her mother on the phone saying that it was finally over, that they had caught up with him. That they were both dead. Izzy had backed away slowly, avoiding the creaky floorboard without even thinking about it, and had gone to have a long hard think in her room. Izzy didn’t mention her father after that, and it was like his absence settled over their house, blanketing it in silence, as her mom didn’t mention him either.

Then her mom got pregnant, Tom claimed responsibility and they officially got together when Milo was two. No one questioned it except Izzy in her own head, when she thought how surprised her mother was by Tom being in her house, by his familiarity, as if she had never noticed Tom in that way before. Which is impossible if you think how Milo came to be in the world. And so now here she is, dressed in light green silk, stealing a quick nicotine fix before she has to go back inside and have people remark how much she’s grown, can’t believe she’s seventeen now, and doesn’t she look like her mother? Uncanny isn’t it? Except for the green eyes of course. And then they trail off and find some excuse for walking away and Izzy could curse her father for dying and leaving so much broken in his path. 

She hears the sound of soft footsteps coming down the drive towards her and she whirls around and puts her cigarette behind her back. Prays her hair doesn’t catch fire. She’s never seen this man before, but he’s dressed in a suit, so he must be a guest. Probably a friend of Tom’s, although he looks younger than Tom, early to mid thirties maybe. Not a trace of silver in his hair, but then this guy is blonde and it is reasonably dark out here, except for the lamplight that illuminates parts of the drive.

“I won’t turn you in. Please, continue to kill yourself through cancer”. British, she knows now, and sarcastic too.

“Thanks”. She takes her hand out from behind and sucks on her cigarette, eyes flashing defiantly. The man chuckles softly.

“And with that look, you gave away your identity. You must be Sydney’s daughter. Isabelle, right?”

“Izzy”, she means to say dismissively, but it gets tangled on her tongue because she’s looked the man in the eyes and their blue-ness startles her into blurting it out. Like the teenager she is, she thinks.

He smiles at her and leans against the wall next to her. She gets a whiff of spices and oranges, something exotic and very male, and her skin gets goosebumps in the eighty degree heat. She grinds her cigarette out beneath her heel, and crosses her arms defensively. She gets the feeling she’s caught in the calm before the storm, that he’ll entrance her with his looks and words while extracting exactly what he wants from her - and he does want something, she can tell. He’s the kind of man her mother warns her about.

“Who are you?”, and Izzy flushes the moment the words come out of her mouth. “I mean, I’ve never seen you around my mom before.”

He continues to smile as if she hadn’t been amazingly rude, and says ”Julian”, while extending his hand for her to shake. Which she does, having found her manners.

“So how do you know my mom?” Izzy wishes she wasn’t so curious sometimes, that biting her tongue would work instead of just causing her pain. Julian looks away for a moment, and then meets her eyes again, no more smile.

“I used to work with her. And then…I moved to a rival agency and the competition got the best of us, so we haven’t spoken in a few years.”

“Oh.”

“I came to see her get married. It was a promise I made to a mutual acquaintance of ours, that wished she could be here.” 

“Why isn’t she?” She really can’t stop herself.

“She died.” Julian replies, as if her curiosity was her right, and that he would do all he could to answer her questions calmly. As if he was in control.

“Oh”, she says again, because she can’t think of anything else to say. She bends down to retrieve her champagne from where she left it on the floor and sips at it, not too sure whether she likes the taste, but pretty sure she likes the feeling.

“So tell me about yourself, Izzy. What do you do, what are you interested in …? I would love to get to know the daughter of Sydney Bristow.”

“I’m applying for colleges. Journalism major.” She pauses, but he doesn’t seem to want to fill the gap, so she goes on. “Only east coast schools.”

“And why’s that?”

“Because I want to get the hell out of this city and its heat. I want to be closer to Europe. And what with Tom being here, and Milo pretty much being the apple of mom’s eye, I figured she wouldn’t really notice if I were gone.” Izzy shrugs to let him know that she’s cool with that, knows that it totally gives her away.

“I doubt that’s true.” Julian says this as if it were gospel. “Your mother loves you, I’m sure. I can’t imagine her favouring one child over another.” 

“She doesn’t ‘favour’ Milo, she’s just more protective. Everything’s about him.” Izzy looks down at her feet to escape his scrutiny and kicks her toe against the drive. “She wants me out of her sight because…” She trails off, unsure if she should continue, but Julian looks at her with big sympathetic eyes, as if he understands. She takes a deep breath.

“Did you know my father?” Julian raises an eyebrow and looks slightly shaken, as if he were seeing a fleeting spirit.

“Yes, and I can say right now that the only thing of him I see in you is his eyes, so don’t go thinking that your mother can’t stand to look at you because of the memories.” Izzy’s mouth, at the end of this vehement sentence, is hanging open. She’s pretty sure she looks as astounded by that outburst as he is. It’s just that he collects himself first.

“How did you know that’s what I think?”

“It’s written all over your face. Your very beautiful face that is just like your grandmother’s, in case you ever wondered where your cheekbones come from." 

“Wow. You know the whole family. How the hell does a stranger that I just met know more about my family than I do?” She’s kinda angry now, jealous of what he knows. Wishes once again her mother told her more.

He laughs and throws his hands up in surrender at her stance, looking her up and down and stepping back a pace.

“But that temper is all your mother’s. I’ve known parts of your family for a while. And I can say right now that _you_ are very special. Perhaps more special to some than your brother.” Izzy’s brow furrows.

“Special to who?” Julian steps back towards her, and his expression alters, eyes flashing darker. The storm is coming, she thinks for a second before brushing it away from her mind.

“Now that would be telling.” Julian leans in and takes her champagne glass, but he doesn’t move his body away. She can feel her anger fading, but the warmth in her stomach that it brought stays and spreads to between her legs at his proximity. “I think you have had quite enough to drink.” His face is so close to hers she can see the tiny lines creeping from his eyes, and exactly how crooked his bottom lip is.

“Maybe” she whispers.

“You drink a lot with your boyfriend?” He murmurs the question into her ear, and his cool breath makes her nipples tighten.

“Sometimes. But we broke up.” She has no idea why she’s telling him this, or why her body is propelling her backwards and his body follows. Or maybe it’s the other way around.

“Why? Did he want to touch you?” And that voice is killing her, making her want to dive into cool water just to get away from its heat.

“I let him touch me. I got bored. He was…”

“Immature?” Julian fills in the blanks as her eyes lock onto his, and she thinks he hears the sound of smashing glass. Do you care? a voice whispers in her head, and she knows what she is going to let him do anything he wants to.

“Did you let him fuck you?” And this he growls, and she wonders when this turned from introductions to dirty talk. Izzy stumbles and is caught in strong wiry arms that slide down her waist to her hips, crushing the silk beneath long fingers, and she is on _fire_.

“Yes” she starts to say before her back hits the wall of the hotel and his mouth finds hers and everything changes. She only tastes the coolness of his mouth and the way his hands dance around her body, with more skill shown in thirty seconds than her whole eight month relationship with Nick. She arches into his touch and the beat of her heart speeds up to match the rhythm of the party going on behind her.

Sex in a public place – at her mother’s wedding. And with an older man, as well, her conscience admonishes her before she tells it silently to shut up. His mouth is insistent, tongue sliding over hers so she moans, hands pushing her dress up and seeking her underwear, cream lace French knickers her mom bought her specially - ripped off in a second. Trampled in the dirt beneath him.

One finger slides into her then another, and she is bucking and gasping into him, his other hand crawling up to circle around her neck and push into her hair. She reaches down and feels for his zipper: she has had sex up against a wall before, but it was mainly to gratify Nick and only really because she wanted to say she had done it like that. This is totally different, she thinks. Julian knows exactly what he’s doing, no fumbling – no one has made her feel this desperate for a man to be inside her before. A mixture of the forbidden and three glasses of champagne on an empty stomach.

She undoes his trousers and reaches for him and then he is inside her, slamming her pelvis against the wall with a groan that is the sexiest thing she’s ever heard and then she realises it is a mixture of their voices together. He is kissing her again, moving frantically between her legs and she feels the pressure build until his thumb finds her clitoris and presses and her world explodes in bright lightning. And then she is back on her feet instead of having her ankles wrapped around his waist, and she feels something sticky running down her thigh and she knows it is him. That thought is enough to make her want him again and she clutches at his jacket, still off-balance.

He grins at her, looking like an ageless blonde devil, and kisses her once, then bends to retrieve her panties and slides them up her legs.

“Well that was fun, if a little unexpected”, she says breathlessly.

“I wanted to do that since I first saw you out here, trying desperately not to care that you didn’t belong in there with them.” She looks up at him, surprised.

“Whenever you want, you call me. You want a job, I’ll train you. You’ll travel the world and show everyone how special you are.” He hands her a card that has a single phone number on it and nothing else. “You might find your place is by yourself, or beside me. But it definitely is not here. Not with your brother.”

Her expression turns quizzical, and he adds, “Because he overshadows the real you. The one everyone should see.” He adds this too hastily, she thinks, but pushes the knowledge that he just twisted the truth from her mind. He bends to kiss her again, drawing her tongue lazily into his mouth and making her knees tremble.

“I would take you away from all this and show you what your heritage really means”, he whispers. Then he lets go of her and starts to back up the drive, leaving her in darkness, leaning against the hotel wall for support. He stops underneath a lamp and the light forms a halo around him, and his eyes shine with something like fervour and for the first time, Izzy can sense the danger in him.

“But if you tell your mother about this, I’ll have to kill you.” His face is deadly serious, and then it splits into a wide smile, and the shadow that crawled across her soul for a moment disappears with the whiteness of his teeth. 

“Tell her that Julian said hi. And that she looked beautiful. But not nearly as beautiful as her daughter.” And with that, he turns on his heel and walks across the grass, away from the hotel.

Isabelle turns the card over and over in her hands, thinking furiously, trying to ignore the throbbing between her legs and the drying liquid on her thighs. Her place is not here by her brother. Milo is special. But not as special as she is.

She looks back at the hotel, and through the window she can see her mom laughing with Tom while Grandpa Jack looks at Milo with a wariness she has never noticed before. She turns her head to stare into the darkness where Julian disappeared and shivers in the warm May air.


End file.
